“And yet, something tied them together, strong than any of that, something with the power to conduct her blood and breath like a symphony, so that anything she did to fight against it felt like discord, like disharmony with her self.”

“Adults were always quick to tell her how much she looked like her mother, and how little like her father. Though Anna thought that on the inside she was much more like him. There was this strong, unbreakable will in her to fight for something, somwhere. But where? for what? and against whom?”

“Eventually she fell asleep, but I kept the phone against my ear, lulled by her breathing, and her breathing again in the background. And yes, it felt like home. Like everything belonged exactly where it was.”

“Fear is a horrible mistress. Yet she clings at my heart like a violinist playing her sweet symphony.”

“The sound of her breathing reminded me, as it so often did, of how vulnerable she was. And how vulnerable we were because of how much we loved her. The fear - that something could happen to her at any moment, something I'd be helpless to stop - had become so omnipresent in my life that I sometimes pictured it growing, like a third arm, out of the center of my chest.”

“And when it comes, her kiss is like something not so much felt as found.”